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Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. We'll talk first today about the US response to the killing of the seven World Central Kitchen aid workers in Gaza. This is a developing story. Even this time, the Biden Administration is saying different things than the Netanyahu Administration, but then continuing to be complicit in the actions they criticize. Here is Pentagon spokesman John Kirby yesterday, appearing to make a direct threat regarding sending more bombs.

John Kirby: There's no changes to their policy and their approaches, then there's going to have to be changes to ours.

Brian Lehrer: That was just an implication that something would change regarding military aid. He didn't say what would change and we've heard that kind of thing before. On March 22nd, The Washington Post had a headline, "Biden administration gauges Israeli compliance with laws of war." The article said, "The State Department had received Israel's written assurances that its use of US-supplied weapons in the Gaza War has not violated international or US laws and its conduct of the war and protection of civilians including the provision of sufficient aid." That was the quote. The article said, "A group of 17 democratic senators was calling on the Biden administration to reject Israel's claims amid the growing debate in Washington over whether the United States should suspend arms transfers." That was on March 27th.

On the 29th, another Washington Post article reported Biden approval of a new arms shipment to Israel that hadn't been made public. Yesterday, The Washington Post had another story headlined, "US approved more bombs to Israel on day of World Central Kitchen strikes." That one says, "The Biden administration signed off on thousands more bombs to Israel despite global condemnation of the IDF's killing of seven World Central Kitchen employees." It says, "The US government has the authority to suspend an arms package any time before delivery, but it has not done so in this case."

The pressure is on in Israel, obviously, to change its actions toward non-combatants in Gaza, and the pressure is on in Washington on President Biden. On MSNBC this morning, Democratic Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, a leader on foreign policy, called for the first time for an immediate pause in the military campaign.

Senator Chris Murphy: I do not believe that opening up a new crossing into Gaza is enough. I was at Americares, a Connecticut-based emergency relief organization. They send medicines into Gaza. They have suspended operations, they and their partners on the ground, not because of a lack of crossings into Gaza, but because they simply believe that the danger to aid workers now is too high. We have seen over 200 aid workers killed inside Gaza. Without a pause in military operations, I just don't think you are going to be able to save lives. I think right now there needs to be a temporary halt so that we can get food and medicine, emergency supplies spread throughout Gaza in a way to save lives.

Brian Lehrer: Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut on MSNBC this morning. Now The Washington Post has a story headlined, "Biden warns Netanyahu the situation in Gaza is unacceptable." It says, "Biden told Netanyahu on the phone yesterday that the United States would reassess its policy if Israel doesn't take immediate steps to address the disastrous humanitarian situation," as the article puts it.

So far no cancellation of that arms shipment that The Washington Post reported the other day was approved still after the bombing of the World Central Kitchen seven, the shipment that includes 2,000-pound bombs as have been used in mass casuality events in Gaza these past six months according to the Post. Listeners, your opinions are up to you. You can judge Biden is doing the wrong thing or you can judge him as walking a difficult line in just the right way.

The reporting is that the cycle of tougher and tougher language, but the same funneling of arms is continuing a pace, at least for the moment. We'll talk to a Washington Post White House Reporter who's been on this feed in just a second, but there's one other aspect to this to touch on first. The presidential election campaign is in full swing after all, so there's the question how different would Donald Trump's policy be if he were to become president? Here's part of the contrast. If Biden is saying to Israel, "Go slower in this war," Trump on the Hugh Hewitt Radio Show yesterday said, "Go faster."

Donald Trump: It is what it is, and this horrible thing happened, and what I said very plainly is get it over with and let's get back to peace and stop killing people. That's a very simple statement, get it over with. They got to finish what they finished. They just have to get it done. Get it over with and get it over with fast because we have to get back to normalcy and peace.

Hugh Hewitt: What's your advice to Netanyahu beyond, "Get it over with in a hurry?"

Donald Trump: Well, that's all the advice you can give. I mean, that's the advice. You got to get it over with and you have to get back to normalcy.

Brian Lehrer: Trump with conservative talk show host, Hugh Hewitt, yesterday. With us now, Washington Post White House Reporter, Yasmeen Abutaleb. Yasmeen, thanks so much for coming on when I know this story is continuing to develop around you today. Welcome to WNYC.

Yasmeen Abutaleb: Thank you so much for having me on today.

Brian Lehrer: I want to start with that Trump clip. I realize you cover the White House not the Trump campaign, but can you make a contrast between what Trump is saying and what Biden is saying? It seems to me that Trump is getting some headlines this morning that are misleading actually, because they focus on him saying the war is a PR disaster for Israel, as if he's criticizing the war policy. He did say the war is a PR disaster for Israel, but he only said it is that because Israel is releasing a lot of footage of bombings of apartment buildings as success stories, but it actually looks bad to the world, not good. He didn't say stop bombing apartment buildings. He said stop releasing the video of it.

We heard him say in the clip that the path to peace and normalcy, as he called it, is to get it over with faster, which is exactly what Netanyahu wants to do based on all the reporting I've seen. Just keep going, keep going hard into Rafah to get the rest of the Hamas fighters despite the humanitarian consequences for civilians that everybody thinks would flow from that. I think these headlines that suggest even Trump is distancing himself from Netanyahu's war effort are thoroughly misleading and exactly backwards. I don't know if you can comment on that. As a White House reporter, can you contrast what Trump is saying with what Biden is saying?

Yasmeen Abutaleb: Absolutely. I think there are a couple important nuances and distinctions to make, so I think you laid it out really well where Trump is saying, "Get it over with," because this is terrible for Israel's public relations and they're rapidly losing global support because of the way they have conducted this war." But he's not saying, "After this, you need to really work towards a pathway to a two-state solution," or he's not even saying, "You need to limit civilian casualties." When he's saying, "Get it over with fast," it's up to the the reader or the listener to read that how they might which is I think the case with a lot of statements Trump makes where the policy itself is very muddled and people can read into it what they want. You could look at that as him saying level Gaza to the ground, but do it quickly, don't prolong the war.

Whereas the Biden Administration, I think their policy has become increasingly contradictory the longer the war has gone on. The Biden Administration right now is specifically opposed to the promised Israeli large-scale invasion of Rafah where about one and a half million Palestinians are sheltering in really horrific conditions in tents and just with no homes because they fled there under Israeli orders.

The US has obviously very worried about a large-scale invasion there because of the mass civilian casualties that would inevitably ensue. I think it's important to note that it's not as if attacks and bombings have stopped over the last few weeks as they've been fighting over what a Rafah invasion would look like, but they are still debating what exactly that it looks like how you take out what they say are the remaining Hamas battalions in Rafah.

I think Trump is saying just finish this up, I don't care how you do it, but I don't want to keep talking about this war because it's terrible for you, but not really saying how to do that or what that means or even including any warnings or urging Israel to limit civilian casualties or allowing more aid or address what has become an absolutely catastrophic humanitarian situation. He's not addressing that in any form.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, and Trump did say the words in that clip, "Stop killing people," but if you listen to the whole thing, he's not saying stop. He's not saying time for a pause like Chris Murphy is saying. He's really saying finish killing people and get it over with that way.

All right, listeners, we'll open the phones on that question in this segment. What do you think would be different for Israel and Gaza, no matter what side or what opinion you have of any of this? What do you think would be different for Israel and Gaza if Trump were in the White House?

212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, call or text. Maybe your answer is nothing, because Biden keeps sending the weapons for the war no matter what he says. Maybe you think it's something, because behind the scenes Biden's trying to do a lot more than Trump would do, or whatever your answer is. How do you think it would be different for Israel and Gaza right now and of course, next year if Trump were in office instead of Biden, with Washington Post White House reporter Yasmeen Abutaleb. 212-433-WNYC. 212-433-9692.

Yasmine, your article on Biden's phone call with Netanyahu yesterday, what's your understanding of what they said to each other?

Yasmeen Abutaleb: The White House provided a summary of the call, and then White House spokesman John Kirby came out and answered a number of questions about the tenor of the call. I think what the White House wanted to be the very clear takeaway is that for the first time, Biden was, we don't-- It was so vague that it's not entirely clear what it means, but the way everyone read it is that Biden was threatening to condition aid or reassess the US approach to Israel, which so far for the past six months has been unconditional aid and support.

Yes, there's been tougher rhetoric over the last two months and obviously public moments of frustration with Netanyahu and the Israeli government but up till now, the US has not fundamentally changed its unconditional support of Israel. Biden was saying that if Netanyahu did not immediately- and Kirby later came out and clarified that meant in the coming hours and days- did not immediately take concrete steps to better protect aid workers, to better protect civilians, to address the disastrous humanitarian situation, that the US would have to reassess its support of Israel and its policy towards Israel.

However, in the same vein, they said, Israel's facing threats from Iran and Hezbollah, and the US support in the face of those threats remains ironclad. It is notable that this is the first time Biden has threatened in any shape or form to even be willing to assess US support of Israel. I think what we know from our reporting, and I think is very clear by the policy over the last several months, is this administration is extremely unwilling to pull back support for Israel, no matter how defiant Netanyahu becomes or how frustrated or angry they become with the way Israel's prosecuting the war.

They gave themselves a lot of room to define what it means to reassess US support. We know Israel announced some steps last night, like opening a new port, opening a new crossing. I think the issue with that is the distribution of aid on the ground in Gaza is disastrous. There has been a collapse of law and order, especially in Northern Gaza. They've defunded UNRRA, which was the humanitarian aid organization best positioned to distribute aid within Gaza.

It's obviously become deadly for aid workers. You played the clip from Chris Murphy. We know World Central Kitchen, a number of these organizations have suspended their operation. The US commended these steps Israel took to open crossings, but I think the even bigger challenge and problem is actually distributing the aid within Gaza. It's not clear how Israel's going to address that.

Brian Lehrer: Right. The Chris Murphy clip did respond very explicitly especially at the beginning of the clip to those announcements that Israel made that you just mentioned, that they're going to open a port, they're going to open another land route, they're going to allow more coming in from Jordan. Chris Murphy said, that's not enough and called for an immediate pause, as he put it, in the war.

Here's a question from a listener that's come in on a text message, and this is a fair question. The listener says, "Israel should stop and not force Hamas to release any hostages." Is your understanding of what Chris Murphy is calling for? Again, I understand you're a White House reporter, not a congressional reporter, but it sounds like rather than wait for a ceasefire negotiation between Israel and Hamas that includes hostage and prisoner exchanges, Murphy seemed in that appearance on MSNBC to be saying to Israel, just stop for a while. Hamas is weakened enough that you can just stop for a while right now to avoid an even bigger humanitarian catastrophe and stop making these kinds of mistakes if they were mistakes like that killed the seven workers from World Central Kitchen. I'm just curious if you hear it that way.

Yasmeen Abutaleb: I actually don't hear it that way because in the summary of the White House call, the president called for an immediate ceasefire, and I thought this was very interesting language, said Netanyahu needed to empower his negotiating team to come to an agreement on a ceasefire, which indicates that they feel Netanyahu has not been. Obviously there are multiple parties in this. This is not to say Hamas has not been an obstacle, or Hamas has been operating in good faith on these ceasefire talks, but he is clearly pinning much of the blame on Netanyahu when he says, empower your negotiators to come to a deal to release many of the remaining hostages and have a six week or however many weeks ceasefire on the ground.

There has been immense frustration with the ceasefire talks, which the administration has been talking about since January that's been going on for about three months. At one point, Biden said he thought a deal would be struck within a couple of days. That hasn't happened. Israel and Hamas are so far apart on the talks. What Biden seems to be indicating is that Israel needs to loosen some of its demands to approve, or sign on to a deal that would see the release of many of the remaining hostages in exchange for that longer-term ceasefire.

I think it's important to note that within Israel, there's immense anger at Netanyahu that people on all sides of the political spectrum do not feel he is doing enough or prioritizing bringing home the hostages. That is a feeling in the US as well. I think you would be hard-pressed to find a US politician who would not also prioritize the release of the hostages, but there is a growing sense that Netanyahu himself is not prioritizing that and that he needs to.

Brian Lehrer: We're getting some calls on the question of what would be different hypothetically if Trump were in the White House right now or next year. Mike in Bergen County, you're on WNYC. Hi, Mike.

Mike: Hi. Hey, thanks for taking my call. To address that question specifically, I'm just going to let Jared Kushner answer, and in his words, which I believe would be Trump's words, which I believe are also Netanyahu's thoughts because I think they're all ancestrally related, they want to level it. They want to tear it to the ground. That would be Trump's policy waterfront property for everyone, but the Palestinians of course.

I will say that I say that as the son of an Israeli-born, proud Jew, Yeshiva-educated American citizen, I don't know what Biden is doing is the best. I don't believe this started on October 7th, though those actions were horrendous and should be addressed. BB must go. That's it.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you very much.

Mike: I'll take--

Brian Lehrer: Do you have the Jared Kushner quote in your head? Did he say something like Mike is attributing to him? Again I realize you're not covering Trump. You're covering the White House, but in case you know.

Yasmeen Abutaleb: Mike is absolutely right. There was a quote that came out about a month after Derek Kushner said it at some Harvard forum where he said there could be valuable waterfront property in Gaza. That, of course, ignited quite a bit of outrage because it sounded up-- He suggested that Israel move all the Palestinians and Gaza to the Israeli desert while they rebuilt this valuable property.

We know it is a minority in Israel, but it is a vocal minority from the likes of Smotrich Ben DeVere, these right-wing cabinet ministers that Netanyahu has that he's quite beholden to keep his coalition together, who are very much in favor of moving the Palestinians out of Gaza and resettling Israelis there.

I think there is a fear. It's very hard to tell where Trump stands right now on his policy, but we know when he was in office, he gave Israel pretty much everything it wanted. They moved the embassy to Jerusalem, which previous presidents had been very reluctant to do because of how escalatory it could be. Jared Kushner, of course, played a key role in the Abraham Accords and in normalizing relations with a number of Arab countries. I think it's unclear what a Trump administration would do to try to prevent if that's what, whether it's a Netanyahu government or another government wanted to reoccupy Gaza or build Israeli settlements in Gaza, how they would address that, but Jared Kushner very clearly came out in favor of that.

Brian Lehrer: Here's a different view, I think, of what would be different if Trump is in the White House. Amir in Yonkers, you're on WNYC. Hello, Amir.

Amir: Hello. Thanks for having us. I think Trump, how he said America first, let's not [unintelligible 00:20:28] conservatives have this idea to let's not waste money abroad. Put America first. Trump had his isolationist policy, so maybe the possibility he wouldn't be inclined to send as much aid to Israel because he doesn't want to waste tax dollars for something abroad and prioritize the people here and he wants to stay out of things. I noticed Biden, he conducted a lot of strikes in Syria like that Iranian general. I also think that the Israeli AIPAC lobby is so strong. Sometimes it might not matter much who is President.

Brian Lehrer: Amir, thank you very much. That's an interesting take on Trump that may be because he's an isolationist and he does talk in general about not wanting to spend a lot of US tax dollars abroad as opposed to here, maybe he would act with more restraint, Amir says. I think Joseph in Clifton sees that differently. Then Yasmeen will get your take on these calls. Joseph, you're on WNYC. Hello.

Joseph: Hi. Thanks for taking my call. Yes, I do see it differently. I believe Israel would be better off if Trump was president. I think it's too cynical to keep calling out Israel on wartime mistakes and spending so much focus on it. Israel is at war because Hamas attacked it on October 7th. Nobody wants war. Israel doesn't want war. Netanyahu doesn't want war. He's doing the best he can in this situation. Mistakes happen, and it's unfortunate.

Brian Lehrer: The question that Chris Murphy raises, and many other people raise, is even if the war against Hamas is justifiable at the outset, or was justifiable at the outset because of October 7th, that the killing of civilians is so disproportional as to make it immoral the way it's being carried out. Do you have no compunctions along those lines?

Joseph: It's being carried out in a war manner, and mistakes happen during war. First of all, the numbers that you say, the proportionality, the numbers that you say have been proven to be false. If it's 30,000, include many, many, many, many Hamas fighters, and we all know that Hamas is hiding in hospitals behind civilians. I think it's very ironic how the media focuses on the fact that Israel attacks hospitals, but they also at the same time mentioned that Israel is being shot at, and there are firefights, there are gun battles in the hospitals.

That means that the people that are in the hospitals, the ones fighting, are not the patients and are not the innocent civilians, are the terrorists. If Israel is being attacked while they are raiding hospitals, I think that means they had to go into those hospitals. Israel is doing the best they can in the situation that they can. We know that Israel does not target, and [crosstalk]--

Brian Lehrer: We have to finish.

Joseph: I just want to say one thing about the seven-- I'm sorry. The seven aid workers, unfortunately, that died. When we focus on the fact that they were targeted, yes, it's precision munition that targeted these vehicles, and it was a mistake. Obviously, it was a mistake just like when Israel shot the three hostages that were trying to get their attention to take them in, they were shot by mistake. Mistakes happen during war. I can't relate to such a thing, but it obviously happens.

Brian Lehrer: Joseph, let me go and we'll discuss some of what you just said. There was a lot in there, Yasmeen, but Israel released a statement this morning that doesn't seem to really indicate that it was a mistake. I could pull up the exact language, but I think they're saying that they believe that there were Hamas fighters in the World Central Kitchen convoy. Not that they didn't know that it was World Central Kitchen convoy. Have you seen that statement?

Yasmeen Abutaleb: Yes. I saw that that was emerging in the initial reports that when they were tracking the convoy, they thought there was an armed man in one of the vehicles, and that was why they targeted the convoy.

Brian Lehrer: On the numbers, I know that we get calls all the time from people saying, "Oh, the numbers aren't real. It's not really 30,000." Of course, the listener is right that they're not all civilians, that there are a lot of Hamas fighters who've been killed, but Biden used the number 30,000 for the total number of deaths, I'm sorry, in Gaza. I believe I've seen an Israeli number, this is an Israeli government number as of a couple of weeks ago, that 12,000 Hamas fighters have been killed, which would mean 18,000 civilians. Are you familiar with that claim, or does the Biden administration get specific in addition to confirming the 30,000 number what the proportion is of civilians?

Yasmeen Abutaleb: No one can actually independently verify the Israeli claims of how many of those killed are Hamas fighters. Of course, they're on the ground in terms of the numbers released by the Gaza Health Ministry. The US does not have independent people on the ground to do that count, but the State Department and the Biden administration have said that they find the Gaza Health Ministry number is reliable and that they are in fact, likely an undercount because of people stuck under the rubble and just the limitations of the health ministry given the conditions in Gaza right now.

Brian Lehrer: Going back to your reporting last month, I mentioned this in the intro to the segment, but that was a while ago now, so some of our listeners may not have heard it. You were on a story last month about the Biden administration gauging Israeli compliance with the laws of war, which that kind of gauging compliance does have to take into effect what we talk about all the time.

The caller says we don't talk about it. We talk about it all the time. The fact that Hamas does embed itself, yes, in hospitals, yes, in apartment complexes, all of that, and that's part of the moral calculation here. The Biden administration received that written report from Israel arguing that it was complying with US and International Laws of war, but Biden was going to make an independent assessment. Did they ever do that or say anything about that publicly that you've seen?

Yasmeen Abutaleb: They did. One thing I just want to note on the casualty numbers is one of the big points of disagreement between the Biden administration and the Netanyahu government are the trade-offs, the calculations the Israeli government and the IDF make in terms of what is an acceptable number of civilian casualties to take out Hamas fighter or a number of Hamas fighters, or what are appropriate actions to take to target Hamas strongholds or where they may be operating.

They do embed themselves in the civilian population, and the US has said that does impose an additional burden on Israel, but they still need to protect civilians and limit civilian casualties even in the face of that. One example that I've reported on before is in November, Israel bombed a refugee camp several days in a row over the course of a week killing dozens and dozens of civilians. They said they took out a Hamas commander in the scope of those bombings, but that was something where the US felt that was not an appropriate calculation, that the number of civilian casualties did not justify taking out a single Hamas commander. It's those types of calculations where the US and Israel have diverged throughout the war.

We've also reported that US officials as early as late October were telling each other, telling outside senior advisors that they were very frustrated at Israel's bombing campaign because they were bombing buildings without solid intelligence that they were legitimate military targets. I think that's just important context when we're talking about the civilian casualties and the divide between Hamas fighters who have been killed and civilians.

Brian Lehrer: By the way, I just want to acknowledge that a lot of people in our area just felt what appears to be an earthquake. Maybe very mild. We don't tend to have serious earthquakes around here, but I'm getting reports certainly from here in Manhattan and from as far away as South Brooklyn that people felt a shaking. Lasted about 30 seconds, according to one person who's chiming in.

We're going to obviously assess what went on there and if there's any damage or anything even worse than that. People are reporting their TVs rattling and computers shaking. There appears to have been some an earthquake in the New York area or something that felt like it to a lot of people. We're looking for details right now. We will probably open up the phones in a little while on this as soon as we can figure out what it was or what's going on.

I just want to acknowledge if you felt something like that, that we are hearing about it from different corners of the immediate area, and we will get to figuring that out. We have a few minutes left with Yasmeen Abutaleb White House reporter for The Washington Post.

I just want to follow up on what you said because this comes up so often that I actually looked up this morning what the laws of war are officially according to the United States. I went to a West Point website called Collateral Damage and Innocent Bystanders in War. It says, "The Law of Armed Conflict permits soldiers to carry out attacks against military objectives with the knowledge that civilians will be killed, provided the attack is consistent with the requirements of the principle of proportionality."

Then, it goes on for pages to describe the principles of proportionality. That's the moral debate here, right? Yasmeen, what is proportional. Even if we accept, which most people do, that Israel has legitimate military objectives here, what's proportional under the laws of war? What is it according to the Biden administration in this particular instance that would cause it to ever say explicitly Israel is, which I don't think it's saying, or Israel isn't abiding by the laws of war as defined by the United States as reflected there on the West Point website? I'm just curious how specific they've ever been asked that question as far as you know, and how specifically they've ever responded to it.

Yasmeen Abutaleb: They've been asked the question many, many times throughout the course of the war. They've never really provided a clear answer. The clearest answer we've gotten is on the looming Rafah invasion, specifically. Biden said this publicly, and I've talked to senior officials privately who, again, are extremely reluctant to condition or suspend or pause military shipments and aid to Israel, but they have said with one and a half million Palestinians in Rafah, if Israel proceeded ahead and was killing tens of thousands of Palestinians in the course of a Rafah invasion, that that perhaps would be a red line and maybe then they would consider conditioning aid.

Again, there's really been no well-defined, this is the threshold they cross, and that's when we start conditioning aid, or that's when we make a dramatic change in our policy, or that's when we no longer support the military campaign. They haven't laid out something like that. They've said in broad strokes, if Israel moves ahead with no regard for protecting civilians in Rafah, given just how packed it is and the number of civilians that are sheltering there, that that perhaps would be a bridge too far. They've been careful to not really specifically lay out what would cross that threshold.

To your earlier question, they did this assessment of whether countries are abiding by international humanitarian law. That same memorandum says there has to be an assessment of whether they are blocking or impeding the delivery and facilitation of US-assisted aid or US-supported aid. That doesn't only include aid from the US but from organizations the United Nations and other aid groups that the US works with.

The State Department, last month, did say Israel was complying and was abiding by international humanitarian law and was not blocking the delivery of aid, which was contradictory to what they were saying publicly. That memorandum that the Biden administration put out just a couple months ago, really at the request of a number of Senate Democrats led by Senator Chris Van Hollen, would- if you found a country to be in violation of international humanitarian law or to be blocking or impeding the delivery of aid, that would result in the suspension of US military aid. I think that's a step they don't want to take right now,

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, we're getting more and more reports from a wider swath of our area on people feeling what appears to have been an earthquake. We're going to open the phones. We don't have a reporter on this yet. We don't have an expert on this yet. Let's report this story together. Our phones are now going to be dedicated for you helping us report this story of what has felt to many people in the New York Metro area to be an earthquake in the last few minutes.

Just call up and tell us what you experienced, and if you see any damage around you, or God forbid anybody got hurt or killed, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692 on that.

Before we make the segue into that segment, Yasmeen, last thing, the seven World Central Kitchen Aid workers' deaths are being treated so differently from tens of thousands of Palestinian bystanders. We hardly ever hear their names, like in this case, or see friends and relatives crying like we saw a lot of Chef Jose Andres on television yesterday, or the same kind of reaction. It must be calling to Palestinians to be so invisible and consider it as a mass, not as thousands of actual individuals and as individual tragedies equally to these victims. Maybe they will be happy from their perspective.

Of course, you know, we keep acknowledging there are many perspectives on this Palestinian perspectives as Israeli perspectives, US and other perspectives. From that perspective, has anyone that you know of asked Biden about that, how differently these victims are being treated in terms of his policy reaction than whatever the number is, many, many, many thousands of civilian Palestinians?

Yasmeen Abutaleb: John Kirby was asked about this in the briefing room a couple of times this week. It's a really important point you made because, before the tragic killing of the World Central Kitchen workers, about nearly 200 aid workers had been killed in Gaza throughout the war, most of them Palestinians working with the United Nations or UNRWA, or other organizations. This has been the deadliest conflict for aid workers.

I think on record, a senior UN official said that the death rate for aid workers was nearly three times that of any other single conflict in a single year. I think obviously the World Central Kitchen, the death of these workers, should be getting the attention it is. I think there is a frustration among Palestinians, among Arabs and Muslims in the United States that the similar killings of Palestinian aid workers throughout the war have not gotten the same kind of attention, the same kind of public outrage that the deaths of these workers have.

Brian Lehrer: Yasmeen Abutaleb, White House reporter for the Washington Post, thank you so much for your time today. By the way, where are you? Are you in DC and did you feel an earthquake?

Yasmeen Abutaleb: I'm in DC, and I did not feel an earthquake, but I hope everyone is safe.

Brian Lehrer: Thanks so much for joining us. We really appreciate it.

Yasmeen Abutaleb: Thank you.

 

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